BRAC is on Track, Officials Say

Top officials from Fort Meade and Anne Arundel County said the federal government is well on its way to completing base realignment and closure (BRAC) activities by this fall, bringing thousands of new jobs to the area.

Col. Daniel Thomas, the installation commander at Fort Meade and Robert Leib, the special assistant for BRAC in Anne Arundel County, said the base will have 48,000 workers by the end of this year, an increase of 13,000 from three years ago.

The pair appeared as guests Monday on The Kojo Nnamdi Show on WAMU (88.5) radio. Lt. Governor Anthony Brown, chairman of the state’s subcabinet on BRAC, and Phil Alperson, the BRAC executive in Montgomery County, also appeared.

Leib said that in addition to expansion of BRAC agencies, 29 companies moved their headquarters to within five miles of Fort Meade and another 49 have expanded. Contractors could represent nearly 10,000 additional jobs for the region, he said.

“The impact is quite large, and it’s adding to our social fabric everyday,” he said.

More than 5,000 jobs will be added to Fort Meade this year as a result of the new headquarters for the Defense Information Systems Agency and Defense Media Activity, and the co-location of the Defense Adjudication activities. U.S. Cyber Command and the National Security Agency are also expected to add thousands of new jobs in the next few years. 

Leib and Thomas acknowledged that the new job growth is straining the area’s infrastructure, as a lack of funds has slowed improvements to nearby roadways. The officials said they continue to push agencies to allow for telecommuting, while encouraging workers to find alternatives to driving.

“You’re talking about central Maryland, where for generations, the habit has been to get in your car and drive to work,” Leib said. “Whatever we can do to reduce the number of vehicles on the road is going to go a long way.”

Thomas said the Defense Information Systems Agency, which is the largest of the new BRAC agencies, has many employees telecommuting. Also, the agency has three subscription buses traveling from Northern Virginia each day, and as many as 12 van pools from Metro stations in Maryland.

An Arnold resident who called into the program questioned whether the new jobs at Fort Meade would be accessible to everyone in the area, given that many require security clearances.

Leib acknowledged that security clearances would be needed for 90 percent of the jobs, but said only a portion of that would require a full security clearance with lifestyle polygraph.

“If you take DISA, for example, they are like a Fortune 500 company. They have jobs from the HVAC repairman to the computer repairman to the human resource specialist and logistician,” he said. “That spectrum is there. Security clearances are an interesting challenge for folks sometimes … but I believe the breadth of opportunities available present a tremendous opportunity.”

A full recording of Monday's episode of The Kojo Nnamdi show is available here, and is also available via podcast on iTunes.